REDMOND, Wash. (CBS Seattle) — Microsoft has been granted a patent for its “avoid ghetto” feature for GPS devices.

A GPS device is used to find shortcuts and avoid traffic, but Microsoft’s patent states that a route can be plotted for pedestrians to avoid an “unsafe neighborhood or being in an open area that is subject to harsh temperatures.”

Created for mobile phones, the technology uses the latest crime statistics and weather data and includes them when calculating a route.

The patent, written in a combination of tech-speak and legalese, was awarded to Microsoft earlier this week. It also described other uses for the new GPS technology.

One section of the patent mentioned that advertisers can use the technology to navigate a user through a newly set up ad campaign.

Hilarious! And the comments to your comment already added another group of cities to your list! I understand that Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore actually has to hire security guards to escort students and faculty to public transportation off-campus. This app can be very useful and may save the lives of some non-Homeys.

Have to admit I desperately wanted this feature when driving (via my GPS’s instructions) into Baltimore to get to Johns Hopkins this past Sept. We were joking that they must helicoptor the students in wearing blindfolds.

Mary, I concur. Per the GPS instructions, drove south on Hwy 1 past Johns Hopkins to the highway. Most of the businesses were boarded up along the route and plenty of peeps offering up little baggies as I drove by. It was a Saturday afternoon so fortunately there weren’t TOO many hangin’ on the corners. That was a long 30 minute drive with virtually no traffic.

And U of Chicago just south of Chicago…the University has their own army of police to protect the white and asian students from the negroids in Hyde Park but there are still at least three or four robberies on campus every week.

i surmise by the first couple of comments I’ve read that people are drawing racial rather than socioeconomical conclusions about the people who live in the “ghetto.” the ghetto is home to a wide range of ethnicities, so keep that in mind when you judge. Also, the reference to monkeys going to the ghetto; one has to find a different representative of of hue-mans than monkeys. After all, monkeys have straight hair/fur, thin lips, & colored eyes. Now whom does that bring to mind.

The ignorance of this thread is shocking. Many of our cities have problems, but I wouldn’t trade living in Baltimore (near Johns Hopkins, by the way) for any of your bland, Walmart lives in a million years. I feel perfectly safe in my city, I’ve never had any problems or dangers and would recommend living here to anyone.

You live in Baltimore and you recommend living there? Did you move there from Detroit? Or did your crack head mom drop you on your head too many times back when your favorite hobby was eating lead paint chips?

F^%k you, Blaks deserve to be made fun of.
“You people” don’t seem to get the fact that it’s your culture that is so disgusting to ALL other races. Even African blacks don’t respect “you people”. That’s truth to entitlement. It isn’t your color, it’s your culture.

Mary, joe, and Gerry you are talking about Johns Hopkins Hospital. The Johns Hopkins University, is actually in a rather nice neighborhood, granted there are some neighborhoods somewhat close to JHU, that may be a bit sketchy. However all in all the area is fairly safe.

scott you have obviously not done much urban driving. standard not to stop at red lights to close to the car in front so you can pull out and evade intruders. a locked vehicle is no protection from criminals.

Not necessarily. In many communities, the street renamed after MLK Jr. was the street that was accessed by the most freeway offramps. Hence, more large green signs spelling out the name. The whole idea was to rub the name in everyone’s faces to the fullest extent possible. Something similar was done in San Francisco when Army Street was renamed Cesar Chavez Boulevard. Army Street, you see, was accessed by TWO different freeways, including the one that carries people between downtown S.F. and the airport.

I lived in Vegas once, and even though it was faster into the city on “MLK” most people from the northern suburbs drove around that area into the city unless it was day time and urgent with your windows up and doors locked hoping for no red lights

“the technology uses the latest crime statistics and weather data and includes them when calculating a route”

Seems completely agnostic to race as specific criteria, depending on what they mean by “crime statistics” and what is contained in the data they use there. Although it may avoid “white” ghettos if it snowed since it includes weather data.

It may be technically indifferent to race, but realistically nearly all of the high crime areas will be black or Hispanic. More significantly, most majority black or Hispanic neighborhoods are high crime areas. Very rare are the white neighborhoods where a person is at risk of being attacked by a stranger who isn’t a police officer.

I know right? I’m sitting here thinking about how this would be done, and it’s be basically the same as “coloring” an area for a park, or a toll road, or whatever typical property we use to classify a road, and whatever data structure you are using just has a flag that says “is_ghetto = 1”.

The only part that is innovative is the part where you name the variable “is_ghetto”! So are proper nouns patentable? Give me a break! US patent office is a joke. I’ll call my feature “avoid economically challenged area”. Jerks.

1 – Kevin saw Obama take a trillion dollars (or ten million $100k jobs) and make it dissapear in the largest money crime in human history.
2 – Kevin received his download from party headquarters
3 – Kevin moved to an OWS camp
4 – Kevin pulled his head from his butt so he could poop on a police car.

You’re absolutely right! We should be able to patent anything, no matter how stupid!
Excuse me while I go patent breathing. I might as well file one for walking a straight line too.

IP laws themselves are terrible. They’re supposed to protect ideas, but they’re built in a way to earn revenue from large corporations. They serve no use to the small business owners that actually need it. For every one success story, there’s a hundred horror stories of epic proportions.

It’s obvious that you are an idiot. You can’t patent(well you can but only because morons like yourself work there) a simple concept. They can patent their code or hardware but not an idea. If they can do that, I can patent the fusion reactor tomorrow. I can’t build one but so what?

This comment appears to be a locus of ignorance given all the wrongheaded comments that it attracts. The code is copyrighted by the fact that it is a fixed expression of an idea. Only inventions or processes are Patentable. Patents are for Novel (aka New), Non-obvious and useful inventions. But while it is probably novel, and certainly useful, I don’t see how it’s non-obvious. People have been talking about marking bad areas on travel maps for decades. But it always seems like lawsuits and/or a desire to not antagonize certain ethnic groups have always suppressed this obviously useful information.

You don’t understand GozieBoy: The exact same map-characterization feature has already been done — “avoid toll roads”. This is obviously not patentable using any honest interpretation of patent law.

And going even beyond that, Google has already patented the pathfinding concept whereby you associate cost to a route using variables — this is just another way of associating cost, presumably the cost of “loss of safety.” Anyway I think all software patents are BS.

I think avoiding an area based only on crime statistics is just as racist as voting for someone based only on the color of their skin. Wait…that doesn’t make any sense. (Must reference my university education here, Lord knows individual, critical thinking is a form of intolerance).

Thinknot, this is the Thought Police. We have your head surrounded. Come out with your Liberal Indoctrination Center papers (read: university degree) up.

You are being charged with Thoughts of an Individual Nature.
That’s a very serious crime in the U.S.S.A. under Dear Leader Maobama.

You have the right to remain indoctrinated, if you give up this right anything you think can and will be used against you in a court of Thought Law. You have the right to a Liberal Attorney. If you can afford an attorney on your own, your property will be seized and redistributed for the common good. Since you can afford an attorney on your own, you are hereby found automatically guilty of being a 1%er and shall be forthwith sentenced to a lifetime of servitude to the State (may she ever be praised). If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you, pad for by the 1%er already serving hard time. Do you understand these rights as I have thought them at you?

Wow. I decided to read these comments hoping for a good laugh, instead, I get nothing but the same anonymous rhetoric that continues to prevent this country from evolving. All collections of people all over the world have those who for whatever reason, feel like society has left them behind. Whether that is true or not, instinctually, you will do what “you feel” is necessary for your survival. I am a Black man born and raised in Washington, DC, and yes there are neighborhoods I would not dare enter. I now live in Texas and there are some roads in Henderson County that many of you wouldn’t dare turn down once the pavement ends so save it. The difference between poor Blacks and Poor whites comes down to location. You’ll never see a ghetto in the country and you’ll never see trailer parks in the city. Black people aren’t even enough of the US population to be as bad as you would like for us to be. My Grandfather is buried in Arlington National Cemetary, my father is an educator with 35+ years experience, and I too am an educator who has worked hard to raise MY family to the best of MY ABILITY…… the best of your ability unfortunately, isn’t the same for everyone.

If you’re going to hate, hate the person for their actions and not for their Race or Nationality….. Because just like the Race card, the Hate card is just as old nd OVERPLAYED. EVOLVE.

You said ‘Black people aren’t even enough of the US population to be as bad as you would like for us to be’. Really? Then how come Blacks do much more crime and violence than other races? It seems like everywhere you look, Blacks are chimping out.

What crime was that? Figuring out how to keep the world from starving? The invention of pesticides? Figuring out to turn the black goo bubbling up from the ground into something that produced plastics, heat and locomotion? How to escape subsistence level farming? You’re obviously a racist idiot.

Facts hurt, don’t they? 52% of murders, 67% of armed robberies, 89% of interracial crimes, 45% of aggravated rapes. What the hell is wrong with you people? And you have the temerity to suggest other people ‘evolve’?

Unfortunately, I see the day coming when you won’t be able to freely express any racist opinions. Speak freely while you still can. . . . Oh, wait — you’re more or less speaking anonymously on the Internet, aren’t you?

Dr. Thomas Sowell, in his book “White Liberals and Black Rednecks”, details how the black folks we laugh about were created by the white rednecks prior to 1861. These redneck whites were called rednecks and crackers hundreds of years ago when they were still in Europe and Ireland. They were dumb, preoccupied with sex, mean, evil, and lazy. They instilled these influences into the slaves they ruled…thereby creating black rednecks.
The black man from the north who had never lived under these influences was educated, hard-working, and prosperous. After the civil war many of the blacks from the south, wanting what the blacks of the north had, moved to the north – bringing their redneck ways with them. Soon all blacks had a bad name.

It may give Sowell comfort to imagine whites entirely responsible for black pathology, but the truth is blacks are consistent in their pattern of criminality and fecklessness. Name a destination of the Black African Diaspora and you’ll find black problems. Trinidad y Tabago. Brazil. Colombia. Not many ‘rednecks’ there I assume. Perhaps the blacks were damaged by contact with the Portuguese or Spanish version of ‘crackers’, Los Cuellos Rojos.

Meanwhile the ‘rednecks and crackers’ of ‘Europe and Ireland’, despite their benighted state, built the modern world. My God, that must hurt. To be black and to matter for so little. Not unlike the Muslims, and we know what that led to.

So useful because crime never happens to people outside of undesirable ethnic areas. Port to Windows phones so folks can have it outside of their cars too please. I want EVERYONE to stay ultra, uber, mega, super safe. I’ll patent the “areas that think you’re out to get them, so they’ll be staring at you all the time” and be even richer, because after race, class and appearance casts a wider net.

I think some of the rental car companies already have this, and have for some time. I was in chicago about 4 years ago, on the far south side, and wanted to get to the near south side. the car’s GPS refused to route me through Englewood, probably the worst neighborhood in chicago, but rather routed me way east, to catch the highway, which would have been many, many miles out of the way. I ignored GPS and took Halsted straight north. as a veteran of chicago, i had no problem, but it was pretty rough.

Rich white kids who are looking for crack, but who get ripped off with sugar cubes instead. Anyone who wants to drive through an unfamiliar city and doesn’t want to be robbed, assaulted, car jacked or killed….you know, people who live in the real world rather than the multicultural utopia some people think exist.

Because the feature actually is patented as an ability to avoid “unsafe neighborhoods”. But everyone knows that is code for “ghetto”. So “ghetto” is quoted because it was not actually used by Microsoft, but everyone knows that’s what they actually mean.

Whole swaths of America are no go zones for whites. And when the sun goes down another the no go zone grows by another 50%. This is a dammed civil rights issue. Where are our congressman on this? If black were routinely raped or assaulted in certain white areas, our good friends in the Jewish atheist media would be all over it.

CIvil rights — ha!!! If anything it is using annonymous data to process a result and give accurate directions. It isn’t the data’s fault that a ghettos are primarily in Black and Hispanic areas. It isn’t that data’s fault that Black and HIspanic areas are lawless and they are raised without fathers. It isn’t that data’s fault that Black areas are full of drug dealers and prostitutes. Whomever came up with this app should be knighted for a service to society and travelers. it is my civil right to not be accidentally guided to bad areas of town because it hurts your feelings that these people allow themselves to live in dumps

Years ago there were incidents in which european tourists drove their rental cars from the Miami airport and made wrong turns into bad parts of town where they were robbed at gunpoint and, in some instances, shot to death.

Their lives might have been saved if they had been given GPS with the ghetto-avoidance feature…

They also need to put up signs like they do here on the Outer Banks”don’t feed, ride, pet, mutilate or kill the horses”. But is should read” don’t feed, look in the eye, give the time of day, give a light, give a ride to the hoodrats.” In truth they are far more dangerous than any species man or animal, in America. 10,000 murders annually. Appalling and no one in the press tackles the issue at all.

How do you know the ghetto even exists, it could be made to control you with you with fear? Or maybe you have seen the ghetto with your own eyes, and how did you ever make it out of such a condemned and dangerous place?

Stickers on the rental cars, or the license plates themselves, gave away the rental status of the vehicles foreign tourists drove. Black thugs followed them out of the airport and eventually maneuvered to “tap” the rental cars’ rear bumpers. When the law abiding tourists got out to exchange insurance information, they were robbed and, as you say, sometimes murdered.

How about a drunk driver death map or a child molester map for people that want to avoid white devils? Or a “missing person” map for all those white people buried or wood-chipped to bits in backyards, basements, and cornfields across the honky hinterland. Just a thought.

OMG you are clueless. You are so easily race baited, like half the people here. The point is that “avoid anything” on a map has first, already been done (toll roads) and second, completely silly! Where does it end?

Wouldn’t work; those are rare events. Each one is major news story because it so rarely happens; black and mexican crime on the other hand are as common as the sun rising and falling. Every day many people are shot, murdered, robbed, raped, assaulted, etc. in black and mexican neighborhoods. Now go back to your affirmative action accepted, federally funded community college, and cry to yourself about the pitful, unevolved state of your race.

The BBC writes that Europeans are 5% neanderthal in genetic composition, which in fact makes whites less evolved than Africans, who have no trace of sub-human genes- look it up, monkey-bo!.

As for “rare events,” 45,000 people are killed by stupid white people and their cars, EACH YEAR. Furthermore, the deaths of millions of Iraqis, Vietnamese, Afganis, and others would argue that your pink-hued race is like a disease that needs to be “cured.”

And your home-schooling fat ass crooked-tooth mama didn’t home school ya like I just did, boy!

The neanderthal is a child rapist no matter what color his mommy happens to be… unfortunately he doesn’t know who his daddy is, could have been any of a couple hundred drug addicts that were in the vicinity at the time of his conception.

Gates did this to prevent any GPS company from implementing the feature.

Gates cannot keep this patent because its obvious. I wrote emails to Magellan over 4 yrears ago requesting that they put this feature in one of their software releases and I am sure they still have a copy of the email. I also asked Magellan to include a feature that would identify the location of churches and they did include that feature. Gates is a fraud and his patent is worthless.

A Patent does not mean that you came up with an original idea. My company has developed and sold many new products only to have someone else apply for a patent. In some cases the patent is issued by the patent office.

We have no problem with this practice. The patent does not stop us from selling products and making money since we have prior history of doing so.

In almost every case, a patent only makes money for the patent attorney that files it. Or the attorney that sues for a royalty.

Also remember that if you file for a patent, you have to explain your idea in detail (including technical drawings). By doing this, you may give someone else an idea to develop a similar product.

By the way, the idea for the ghetto/high crime avoidance feature has been around for at least 20 years. You may remember a rash of European tourists were being robbed and or killed in Florida in rental cars.

Sorry, pal. Your e-mails are meaningless. The new patent law allows claims based on when the patent was filed, not by the inventor’s notebooks or any other such evidence any longer. So, if they filed it before anyone else, they could still win the patent, assuming it’s approved. That is the way the new law reads.

I think it’s amusing that some people automatically associate the term ‘Ghetto’.

“The term was originally used in Venice to describe the area where Jews were compelled to live.”

“The term became more widely used for ghettos in occupied Europe in 1939-1944, when the Germans reused historic ghettos to confine Jews prior to their transportation to concentration and death camps during the holocaust.”

People have a right to be informed when safety is involved. In my city there are many safe predominately blacki neighborhoods, one is even wealthy, and black people live in every part of the city, but you don’t want to visit certain areas if you can avoid it. not being racist, just being safe…

As the snow flies
On a cold and gray Chicago mornin’
A lost white boy drives his car
stay out the ghetto

And his mama cries
Cause if there’s one thing that she don’t need
Is for her young man to try to buy his weed
stay out the ghetto

People, don’t you understand
The white boy needs a helping hand
Or he’ll get lost and never be seen again
Take a look at you and me,
Are we too blind to see,
Do we simply turn our heads

And look the other way
Microsoft comes up with a plan
They have an ap for those
Buyin from the street as the cold wind blows
Stay out the ghetto

But his desire to burn burns
So he starts to drive the streets at night
But his phone’s ap says don’t turn right
And you will be alright
Stay out the ghetto

Then one night in desperation
The white man breaks away
He leaves his phone, drives car,
Tries to buy, but he don’t get far
And his mama cries
As a crowd gathers ’round a white young man
Face down on the street with no phone in his hand
Stay out the ghetto

As her young man dies,
On a cold and gray Chicago mornin’,
Another white boy is driving lost, trying to
Stay out the ghetto
And his mama cries

I hear you fools putting down black folk. We got a movie out called Red Tail about how we won the world war with our proud tuskegge airmans(GO see it).Look it up we built the pyramids and first aqeuducts in Africa too. We dominate sports and music & have to work twice as hard to get the same pay.But we up to it, dont worry about that.

I DID see it! It was a true story & it was a good one. I also saw interviews of the REAL dudes that flew those missions and I was genuinely impressed.
The (white) bomber crews aggressively campaigned for the Red Tails to do thier escort. It should inspire the black community to bust thier tails to be like them.
Sadly, the character of those guys is not present in today’s ghettos.
I judge, not on the color of thier skin but the content of thier character.
And MLK is cool with that.

Dexter you forgot to tell everyone how you black folk had wings and flew around the pyramids and that black scientists created white people and we got lose like Frankenstine (yes I know of Louis Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam beliefs too)….as far as the Tuskegge airman are concerned, they were Americans who fought Bravely and with Valor in WWII…Not African Americans….Americans! And in reply to the work twice as hard for same pay…tell that to Herman Cain who was excoriated for his success, BY BLACK FOLK….

Lol Dexter, you had an awesome parody comment on a Detroit (I think) thread a few months back, I recognize the style. I remember “lecturing in Afro-studies” & “we built the pyramids and what-not”, ha ha…

Only seen the previews, looks like a good movie, aside from the spaterings of modern slang. History does show the red tails were credited with shooting down three me 262 fighters. But I must question the inference that the black aviators and troops single-handedly won world war two. Also, the builders of the pyramids were not black, but of a mediterainian ethnicity, like the arabs, greeks, and italians. The first aqueducts were built by sub-saharan africans after being influenced by the egyptians and jewish kingdoms. They did not build the first on the continent. It was in the Nubian kingdom where these were built.

It’s Tuskegee Airmen. The word “men” is the plural of man. I am black and I know that. You have got to be kidding us about the pay thing. There are plenty of black people I know that make six figure incomes, and don’t have to work twice as hard. It’s all about education. It’s not about black or white– the people who didn’t pay attention in school, the people who disrupted the class, the people who talked the whole entire time and made it harder for others to learn are the ones that suffer in the long run. Trust me I know, I went to a high school that was 70% black, and there was always some guy or girl in the classroom causing trouble for others. If you wanna make something out of yourself, learn about your culture in something more than movies and media, and get an education, then you wont have to work as hard. Seriously, you make us black people look bad.

You’re whining about the wrong stereotype sweetie. It’s the black men that get pulled over for that one. Maybe you meant an app that avoids areas where you have to speak in non-ebonics to be viewed as intelligent.

I think MS uses a simple algorithm I discovered a few years back. This will work anywhere in the continental US. Just count the number of pawn shops, fried chicken restaurants, and check cashing stores. Is the total greater than three within a two-block radius? RUN…

I’ve lived in and traveled to many cities over the years, including Detroit, Dallas, L.A., D.C., Chicago and New York. However, I’ve only been a victim of a crime in places not known for crime … Colorado Springs, Seattle and Wichita. Ultimately your safety is more dependent on being vigilant than any specific locale. I was constantly on guard in the cities known for crime and let my guard down in the “safer” locales.

You really think Furman planted evidence? You really think that Ni^%er O.J. should be free because his lawyers villified the cops?
Your as liberalas it gets someone may shoot you some day and then you will love those racist white boys.

You can tell the projects from the freeway… You know, the neighborhoods that look like third world s^&tholes with all the housing looking the same and equally run down because no one takes care of free s^&t,. Oh,and theMLK thing.

If those areas are unsafe then they will show up on the app since it is driven by crime stats not race. But of course you consider it a racist app because it forces you to accept and acknowledge what your kind (Libs & minorities) refuse to acknowledge, but know in your hearts, that minority areas are crime ridden Hell-holes.

Could have used this in New Bern, NC. Instead of routing me to the next big boulevard to turn to downtown, Google Maps had me turn a few streets early, right through a housing project. Lots of slow speed bumps and folks openly staring at me wondering why I was in their project.

It also comes with an Eco-Terrorist Avoidance App that keeps you and your SUV safe by steering you clear of cities like Seattle, Portland and LA. If you can’t afford the getto app a good rule of thumb is to always know where Martin Luther King Blvd and all welfare offices are in any city you travel too and just stay away from there.

Speaking of ignorance. Anyone who assumes hillbillies are racists is just as ignorant as someone who assumes a confederate flag-raiser is racist — is just as ignorant as someone who assumes a ghetto is unsafe because blacks live in them. Ghettoes are unsafe because of the socio-economic class, not because of blacks. Where do you think Don Vito Corleone was living as a young man? Upper Manhattan?

‘…Ghettoes are unsafe because of the socio-economic class, not because of blacks. Where do you think Don Vito Corleone was living as a young man? Upper Manhattan?…’

Whites and Asians of modest means have a far lower crime rate than blacks of similar means. This is supported by FBI stats and by U.S. Census data.

Don Vito Corleone is a fictional character. But note that immigrant slums of the early 1900’s were impoverished to a degree unknown by any blacks today. Yet they were still safer in comparison to black areas today, virtually all of which were once white neighborhoods.

Something is seriously, profoundly wrong with blacks. One day we will be able to stop pretending otherwise.

Makes me Chuckle, I can think of places that should be on there, like Wildomar, California. For every honest person there is 100 ghetto people, I should know, I live on a place the the Farm, should call it the Ghetto! There are so many mexican’s wearing their white shirts fixing cars in the front yard and taco grease covering the shirts.

I already programmed my Garmin to talk jive. What I’d like would be for the GPS to use the dialect of the neighborhood: If I’m in a black area, talk jive; If I’m in a Mexican area, talk broken Spanish. I really want my GPS to give me the full cultural experience.

Will it include Mexican occupied parts of our towns and cities? Like half of Marshalltown, Iowa? Here in the mid west illegal immigrants control large areas. They make it very clear that whites are not welcome. In fact the Marshalltown Walmart has bilingual signs, with the English sides turned so you can’t read them!

Microsoft’ “avoid the ghetto” feature for GPS device could just as well be called “avoid heavily black areas.”
It warns the user of high crime areas, which general mean areas with a high percentage of black people and/or illegal aliens.

This is only fair. There is an app by a tax payer funded professor to help illegals walk across the border. I really hope they include Mexican occupation zones. Like major parts of Mid-West cities and towns. Yet another example of how technology is helping us survive a hostile government. http://www.stormfront.org and nsm88.org are examples of how we are connecting and organizing for self defense. Check them and others out. The news links section of Storm Front is very enlightening.

My parents were lost in New Orleans and they stopped for directions. The black guy they stopped to ask told them they needed to get out of that area and not come back as fast as they could. Than he gave them some very good directions that lead them straight out of the place. There are plenty of places in this country white people can’t go safely. That isn’t racist me to say, that’s just reality.

Blacks commit 52% of murders, 45% of aggravated rapes, 89% of interracial crimes and 67% of armed robberies. That’s why whites, and other non-blacks, are afraid of blacks. Through the vehicle of crime blacks have ethnically cleansed hundreds of formally white neighborhoods; Mattapan, Marquette Park, West Chicago, etc. This is euphemistically called ‘white flight’. How many Asian shopkeepers have been murdered by black robbers? Nary a week goes by that I don’t hear of another such murder.

Plenty of Dem ‘hoods are safe. Largely because they are middle and upper middle class white neighborhoods. What makes a neighborhood unsafe is the presence of blacks, and to a lesser degree, non-white Hispanics.

Please remember, Detroit didn’t die because of industrial policy, but because of the Dark Undertow.

Realistically the GPS would say: “avoid the United States as a while since it’s just one giant dump ghetto and buy a plane ticket to Western Europe” (assuming it doesn’t become ghetto fast because their debt crisis)

I’m mixed race, look mostly white and lived with my Family and young son who looks all white in three different mostly black neighborhoods in Denver. That was before I lived in Santa Ana, Ca. which was at least half Hispanic. Never had a problem. What a bunch of pansies on here…

As A “Ghetto American” I object to any device that keeps potential prey from entering my kill zone. How shall I purchase designer products to please my many brood sows and their litters of offspring, without making you a victim of my violent anti social behavior?

I was part of the Beta testers for this software.. I wasn’t impressed… Sure it avoided the places of color, err… I mean the “ghetto’s” but the downside was that instead of taking me to my destination, the device kept directing me toward the nearest Microsoft Computer Store…

I was part of the Beta testers for this software. I wasn’t impressed. Sure it avoided the places of color, err… I mean the “ghetto’s” but the downside was that instead of taking me to my destination, the device kept directing me toward the nearest Microsoft Computer Store.

I was part of the Beta testers for this software. I wasn’t impressed. Sure it avoided the places of color, err… I mean the “ghetto’s” but the downside was that instead of taking me to my destination, the device kept directing me toward the nearest Microsoft Computer Store……

All for it and if some don’t like it they can wake the hell up and realize real Americans are sick and tired of political correctness it time to say it like it is and gehtto world is their problem I didn’t create the animals living and hunting there and I certianly am tired of supporting them. I am not going to drive or walk though those areas. If everyone is so equal why don’t they straighten their dam mess neighborhoods up and stop asking everyone else to do it. STOP HAVE BABIES WHEN YOUR NOT MARRIED AND CAN NOT AFFORD THEM. STOP LETTING YOUR CHILDREN RAISE THEMSELVES-THEY ARE DOING A LOUSEY JOB OF IT. STOP DOING DRUGS, SELLING DRUGS, TRAFFICING DRUGS. STOP ALL YOUR ILLEGAL ACTIVITY. And everyone stop pointing fingures about who knows about this andcame up with it. Liberals if you have the right to your opinions and feelings so do those of us that don’t like any of it so here is the best idea- let all the liberals go live and work in the gehtto and they can straighten it out while being raped, beat and murdered show us how its done but hte rest of us are going to buy this product for sure.

Liberals should start loosing sleep for the mess they created with their laws put in place from the 60’s.

We should sterilize and eliminate voting privileges for all families (mother, father (if he can be found – else cut the benefits in 1/2), children) living off any type welfare (food, housing, homeless, living, …) for over 6 months. This would eventually lead to an end of poverty, crime and make the future better instead of perpetuating the problem as we’ve been doing since the 1960’s

If peeps in those communities don’t like the ghetto label, then change your behaviors and don’t at criminals! Parents that live in those areas, get out of the bars, take care of your kids and stop hanging around the low lifes. It’s not rocket science so just do it.

It’s funny to read some of the comments from dopey liberals who are screaming “racist”. Notice how they fail to see what everyone else considers common sense…that blacks = crime, and MOAR blacks = MOAR crime.

White people build pre-decrepit builidngs, put a bunch of burn barrels around, strew old wrecked cars here and there and put garbage all over the place.

Than we force black people to live there. Than they attack/kill and/or rob any white people who venture into their zone.

Instant ghetto. It’s not their fault, really.

What we really need is an app that shows stores that are selling Air Jordans. Man, you want to avoid those places. I notice there were no riots and violence in the lines waiting for the new iphone or ipad. Few blacks in line, if any.

My company Street Smart USA developed a much more complete and valuable data model which has been available for years on TomTom and Garmin GPS units as well as on Smartphones.

Targeting area such as ghettos offers little to no value to the traveler, nor does using simple crime statistics. Violent crimes are not committed where people assume they might be. High risk and unsafe area identification is far more complex then that. Our product identifies and alerts users of potentially unsafe areas which have been identified using a number of key data elements and proprietary algorithms that accurately mark areas as unsafe to personal or property safety.

If you want a product that is proven with years of development and a track record that reflect true personal safety then check out http://www.streetsmart-USA.com.

I call what Microsoft is presenting and what you speak of the “spider-web perception”. The inaccurate assumption that criminals sit in their neighborhoods – their ‘webs’ if you will, waiting to prey on infrequent unsuspecting victims that may stumble into it. That’s simply not how it works. Criminals are opportunists and that doesn’t afford a lot of opportunity.

Violent crimes are not concentrated or limited within ghettos or low income areas. In fact, a large part of violent crimes occur in bordering neighborhoods, areas with high gain potential for criminals or areas where volumes of unsuspecting targets traffic.

Yes ‘ghetto’ areas may be unsafe but they are far from the only areas where assaults, muggings, robberies, rapes, drug or gang clashes occur. If it were that simple we would only need to police those areas.

And yes, I have driven may times and in many cities through ‘ghetto’ areas and I am on higher alert to the potential of being a victim, however, I don’t simply fear the people, because not everyone there is a threat or criminal.

Every white country on earth is supposed to become multicultural and multiracial. EVERY white country is expected to end its own race and end its own culture. No one asks that of ANY non-white country.

The Netherlands is more crowded than Japan, Belgium is more crowded than Taiwan, but nobody says Japan or Taiwan will solve the RACE problem by bringing in millions of third-worlders and assimilating and intermarrying with them.

Everybody says the final solution to the RACE problem is for EVERY white country and ONLY white countries to bring in the third world and assimilate with them.

Immigration, tolerance, and especially assimilation are being used against the white race.

All this immigration and intermarriage is for EVERY white country and ONLY white countries.

Anti-white is called anti-racist, but it leads to the disappearance of one race and only one race, the white race.

Anyone wondering why you want to stay out of a “ghetto” (and don’t forget, this isn’t about race, it’s about racial concentration in an area: i.e.: if you are not “one of them”, you don’t belong there) has never been approached on a public sidewalk and been accused of “trespassing” because you look different.

If you ever get a chance to travel outside of the United States, you might be able to see past your programming. Then again, maybe not. Although I do believe that there are identifiable ethnic characteristics, there is nothing inherently wrong with any ethnic group, only with individuals within it.

Thankfully I have the intelligence to understand that the ignorance of some of the posters here – of whatever ethnicity – does not represent their entire race.

I fully expect to find ignorance wherever I go, but I am always confident that I will be able to bypass them in order to connect with thinking, evolved individuals who can actually SEE.

I’ve gotten attacked in all sorts of areas. Black, and White, Never Hispanic. I feel totally safe among Hispanics. Good people. Worst areas were Long Beach CA and Lakewood CA. Craziest kids on drugs were in Seattle subburbs. I have liven all over the Western USA and Western Mexico.

I don’t feel like kissing anybody’s ethnic sensitivity If the device’s algorithm is based on crime statistics, “unsafe” has a basis in reality.

I don’t care about the complexion or ethnic origin of whomever might rape, rob and murder me (probably in that order). Just keep me on a path that is safe. By all means, don’t send me through a war zone.

I can believe you people! Avoid streets with names like Martin Luther King ? really ? How shallow minded the world has become is unbelievable to me! Its one thing to say avoid high crime areas. I get how that could be helpful. But to stereo type a community just because of the street name or the majority of ethnicity who resides in the community is WRONG. SHALLOW, and STUPID.
And what really takes the cake for me on this one is that Microsoft has the patent on this but when asked by CBS they declined to comment. Really ? You obliviously felt song enough about it to ask for the patent on the terminology for your technology now dig your balls out from behind your ass and defend it microsoft! By running and hiding behind it your just proving the the rest of the world what a bunch of gutless wonders you are. I would be ashamed to be associated with or part of such a racist project.

Microsoft should be ashamed. I’m not saying it b/c the app will have you avoid Black/His people in the city. Who cares about that? Avoid who you want when you want. All Microsoft had to was name it “avoid crime” inside of “avoid ghetto.” Sure, people on the internet would have turned it into a race war, because people who don’t use their real name, face, or address always do. I”ve never seen any of you in a coffee shop debating race related issues, but when you have an opportunity to make an anonymous racist remark, you cowards always step up to the plate. But I expected more from Microsoft, and when they throw around derogatory terms, I get offended, The term ghetto became widely used when the Germans reused areas to confine Jews prior to their transportation to concentration and death camps during the holocaust. Even though it is now more a term for inner city, poverty stricken, neighborhoods, look at the history of the word! Really Microsoft? You couldn’t think of any else? Before today, I was never really an Apple person, but God, please send Steve jobs back to us!

I have lived in Atlanta, south side for ages. Worked downtown, passed by winos, disabled, crazy people at the five points station. I’ve had occasion to rescue a friend downtown at 2 am, surrounded by the sort that come out after dark. You know, in all honesty, I was treated with the greatest respect by all. Actually I can think of another four times in different ‘Superbad’ neighborhoods at late hours, each time I was treated so nicely it amazed me. The wino, the hotrodder, the clubber, they are all just people man, and if you are respectable to them you will get respect back! I’ve had a crowd around me, desperate to help me in some way each time. I was a little nervous the first time but calmed down when I chose to see their humanity instead. I only wish I’d had some change to tip with, I mean when someone is digging your front tire out for you for two hours while the tow truck is on the way…on the Marta trains I got so used to the regular dark skinned people I only felt afraid when the North side moms came down on the trains screaming at their teens, lol. Go volunteer or something until ‘these people’ look normal to you!

Wow at the people using race as an issue here…
My only question is why they chose to avoid areas with the highest crime rate instead of areas where individuals who have committed serious crimes reside. It makes it look like they are TARGETING minorities. Its sad how many close minded individuals have posted on this article. I read over these posts and felt as though I was in the 1940’s. You have no respect for others or yourselves for that matter. Stop making race the center or every issue. That is whats holding America back. *Oh, and by the way I am black.

This is going to be rough for some poor folks living in the wrong part of town. I graduated from Georgia Tech, but I live dirt cheap so I can retire young. I’ll move to a nicer place when a significant other or wife asks me to move. I can see it now:

Hey guys, come on over! We’re watching a movie, drinking, and then heading out from here!

Many phone calls later, “Yes, I know your GPS can’t find the place, no… I can’t imagine why… ok, you just turn left on MLK…”

Wow, a quick glance at these comments really reveal a certain angry segment of our population has WAY too much time on their hands. They’re in need of jobs, then maybe they won’t be as angry. Or won’t have as much time to spew such baseless venom.

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